Legal professionals should remain ‘politically neutral,’ new president of Hong Kong’s Law Society says
Hong Kong Free Press
The Law Society of Hong Kong should remain “politically neutral,” the new president of the century-old legal group has said, adding that legal professionals should refrain from viewing things from a political perspective.
Meeting the press as he began his three-year term as president on Tuesday, Roden Tong said he was very confident in the city’s judicial system.
When asked how he viewed recent remarks made by British judge Lord Sumption, who resigned from his position as an overseas non-permanent judge on the city’s top court last Thursday, Tong said Hong Kong had experienced many “abnormal incidents” over the past few years.
“As a law society with a membership of over 13,000 lawyers, we were inevitably involved in the whirlpool of politics,” Tong said in Cantonese, “But I want to say, as legal professionals, we should interpret laws from a legal perspective. We should not view things from a political perspective.”
“The Law Society of Hong Kong has a responsibility to maintain political neutrality and guard our posts from a legal perspective,” he added.
Hong Kong has seen three foreign judges announce their departures from Hong Kong’s top court in recent days. Sumption, who was among the trio, wrote about his concerns regarding Hong Kong’s rule of law in the Financial Times on Monday, saying the city was “slowly becoming a totalitarian state. “
According to the solicitors’ society, Tong is the chief executive of an insurance company and “actively promotes legal education for youth.”
Tong arranged for Hong Kong students to visit various disciplined forces and learn about the laws after the 2019 protests and unrest, Tong told pro-establishment media Kin Liu last year, when he was the Law Society’s vice-president.
“I was heart broken at the time. We have spent so many years educating young people about the rule of law. How did [their awareness] disappear so quickly? Why did their awareness of obeying the law become so weak? ” Tong said in the Cantonese interview when talking about the 2019 protests.
Tong is currently a member of the Central Advisory Board of the Junior Police Call, a group under the Hong Kong Police Force aimed at promoting awareness of the law among adolescents and training young talent to join the police.
Apart from Tong, the law society’s council also re-elected Amirali Nasir and Christopher
Yu and elected Careen Wong as vice-presidents.
‘Liberals’ lose out on council seats
Over the past few years, lawyers seen to hold more liberal views have gradually lost their seats on the governing council of the legal group.
In the society’s 2021 election, one such candidate announced he would withdraw from the election three days before voting took place, citing safety concerns.
“For my safety, and the safety of my family, I am announcing my intention to withdraw my name as a candidate for re-election to the Council of the Law Society of Hong Kong,” Jonathan Ross said in a statement released that August.
The decision came days after then Chief Executive Carrie Lam warned the Law Society to remain neutral.
The following year, human rights lawyer Mark Daly, dubbed “the only liberal” by media and critics, lost his re-election bid for a seat on the governing council.
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